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No. Rec. 142 



THE SCHOOL AS A FACTOR 

IN NEIGHBORHOOD 

DEVELOPMENT 



BY 



CLARENCE ARTHUR PERRY 




Reprint from the Proceedings of 

The National Conference of Charities and Correction 

Memphis, Tenn., May, 1914 

Reprint No. 20 



DEPARTMENT OF RECREATION 

RUSSELL SAGE FOUNDATION 

130 East 22nd Street 

New York City 



Price 5 Cents 



11-14-10 



Monograph 



IHE SCHOOL AS A FACTOR IN NEIGHBORHOOD DEVELOPIMENT 



Clarence Arthur Perry, Russell Sage Foundation, New York City. 



There are two ways of regarding the school as a social center. 
According to one it is the machinery which society has contrived for 
preparing its immature members for the responsibilities of citizenship 
and it operates through little working plants which are centrally lo- 
cated in the communities they serve. Points from which certain in- 
tellectual and other commodities are distributed — such are schools in 
the older and broader sense. 

In this sense the school's function is rapidly broadening. School 
plants are now in various places centers of both mental training and 
bodily training, and for adults as well as children. But also they 
are becoming the places where neighbors vote, discuss common affairs, 
view beautiful pictures, hear music, dance and play. As an institu- 
tion through which society discharges certain functions it is gradually 
changing its character and while the dynamic forces are social needs 
the reason why the school has been selected as the place for meeting 
them is to be found in its central relation to those portions of the 
population which are known as neighborhoods. 

In the second and narrower sense the name "social center" is given 
to certain schools where, after the day sessions are over, staffs of paid 
or volunteer workers come in to carry on various civic, social and 
recreational activities. That is, it is the term applied to that part of 
the school's organization which is discharging some of the newer 
functions being performed by the school in the first-mentioned and 
larger sense. Social center in the second sense is included in social 
center in the first sense. 

In both of these meanings school centers affect neighborhood de- 
velopment, but in the limited time at our disposal only the more salient 
points under each can be touched upon, and under the first and broader 
signification my remarks will merely enumerate some of the more 
striking events that are indicative of the rapidity with which school 
extension is actually taking place. 

Elevating Political Life 

During the winter before last school buildings in 31 cities to the 
number of over 500, were used for voting purposes. Boston has for 
several years now used a large number of schoolhouse basements for 
this purpose, and has developed special equipment which is stored 









J 



away when not in use. In Milwaukee the basements are also used. 
There is no question but that the growing extension of the suffrage 
to women is furthering the use of school buildings for political purposes. 
This was notably exemplified in Chicago during the recent municipal 
election. One hundred and forty-two political meetings were held in 
school buildings and the Board of Education reports that in no case 
was it necessary to require the forfeiture of the $25 deposit be- 
cause of damage or infraction of the rules of the board. No smoking 
was permitted, and no indications of disorder were apparent after 
the audiences had left the premises. Seventy-five of the Chicago schools 
were also used as polling places and in only six instances were there 
any complaints about smoking or other violations of the rules prescribed 
by the school officials. Chicago is certainly to be congratulated upon 
the excellent example it has set in the devotion of its school buildings 
to political purposes. Throughout the country there is a growing tend- 
ency to resort to school buildings for deliberation upon matters of civic 
and political import. At the present time discussions of the proposed 
new charter for Buffalo are being held in public school buildings of that 
city. During the past winter Springfield, Illinois, has considered various 
referendum propositions in its school buildings with decided success. 
In preparation for the constitutional convention in Ohio discussions 
of proposed amendments were held in many schoolhouses throughout 
the state. And it is notable also that wherever the initiative and 
referendum prevail there you will find a tendency to resort to the 
natural meeting place for the neighborhood when it wants to talk 
things over — the public school. 

New Community Services 

Another striking feature of the movement is the growing tendency 
to adapt the school plant physically for a more general community use. 
The new Washington Irving High School in New York City has a lobby 
specially constructed to serve as an art gallery and it is now being so 
used. Its stage is completely equipped for presentations of hona fide 
drama. Its offices include an employment bureau and a room for the 
local neighborhood association, also used as a museum. Here were ex- 
hibited the manuscrips of Washington Irving, whose residence still stands 
across the street from the school. The evening school is so organized 
here that the night students can come directly from their places of 
work, have supper in the lunch rooms, recreation in the gymnasiums 
and take up their studies with refreshed minds and bodies. 

Tomorrow Mrs. Breckinridge will tell you about the new Lincoln 
School in Lexington, another school plant which has been specially 
designed to meet neighborhood needs of more than academic character. 
Every now and then in the educational journals one sees accounts of 
school buildings in the smaller communities similar to the Cordaville 
School at Southboro, Massachusetts, where a public library and town 
meeting place are provided in addition to the usual equipment. The 



schools at Gary, Indiana, with their extensive playgrounds and luxurious 
gymnasiums and swimming pools are well-known and are the precursors 
of a type which is increasing in popularity. 

In Natchez, Mississippi, a former wealthy citizen has recently built 
a model school as a memorial to his family which is remarkably well 
equipped as a neighborhood center. The most striking feature is the 
library, with its reading room, reference room, stacks and delivery 
desk. The success which Grand Rapids is having in using its public 
schools as branch libraries justifies this sort of addition to the public 
school building. A large swimming pool and fully equipped gymnasium 
are also to be found in the Carpenter School at Natchez. The assembly 
room, which is composed of two class rooms separated by a sliding 
partition, is unfortunately located on the second floor. While in this 
respect the building does not come up to the standard which holds now 
in many cities for ward school buildings, the other features are indeed 
notable. 

Class-rooms Becoming Club-rooms 

Another marked development that is adding to the utility of class- 
rooms is found in the increasing vogue of movable chairs and desks. 
The Washington Irving High School already mentioned is equipped 
throughout — with the exception of several special rooms — with flat- 
topped tables and ordinary oak chairs. The Moulthrop movable chair 
is now to be found in over 200 communities, in several places entire 
schools having been equipped with them. New York City has just 
given a contract for Moulthrop chairs for a new Brooklyn school, and 
it has been adopted for all of the city's open-air schools. In Chicago 
and other cities where it is being tried, it is reported successful from 
both the academic and social standpoints. 

A new movable chair has been developed by Mr. Van Evrie Kil- 
patrick, a long-time principal of one of New York's public schools, which 
seems destined to a wide usefulness. New York City has already con- 
tracted to equip one entire school with this new desk and chair. It 
is of a two-unit type, and has the advantage that the desks can be put 
in a line around the walls and the chairs brought out into the room 
for meetings and club purposes. 

Such briefly are some of the more salient aspects of the broadening 
function of the school. The list is especially incomplete in that it 
does not include the very striking development of recreational and social 
activities, a fault which will be repaired, however, in the second half of 
the paper to which we have now come. 

Taking up now the social center in the narrower and more popular 
sense, as an institution having a specially trained staff operating on 
the school premises after the day classes, have departed: How do 
the various social centers differ in the service they perform for their 
neighborhoods and the relation which they bear to them? To illustrate 
the principal varieties of this work from the standpoint of neighborhood 



development I have selected several types of social center administra- 
tion. The inclusion or the omission of any city is not to be regarded 
as a commentary upon the character of its work. The cities selected 
are those with whose work I happened to be best acquainted and in 
discriminating between them and in my characterizations of them I do 
not wish to be regarded as either criticizing or praising the persons 
who are directing the various systems. Often the type of work they are 
conducting is determined by circumstances over which they have no 
control. 

Furnishing a Wholesome Evening Environment 

Perhaps the most prevalent type of social center work is illustrated 
by that which is carried on in the Chicago schools. Here we find in 
some two dozen public schools groups of principals and teachers re- 
turning to the schools twice a week for the purpose of affording young 
people from fifteen to twenty-five the privileges of a reading room, 
parlor games, gymnasium, club rooms, choruses, amateur orchestras, 
dramatics, debating clubs, dancing, etc. While the principals of the 
various centers are given entire freedom in getting up their programs, 
the work is nevertheless much the same in all the schools. The prin- 
cipals hold conferences three or four times a year and through the 
comparison of notes and the similarity of the accommodations in the 
various schools a uniformity of administration naturally arises. Ama- 
teur theatricals are stimulated by making it possible for a good play 
to be presented in several schools, and in the Smyth center opportunities 
for social dancing are provided on an extra evening for the definite 
purpose of off-setting the influence of nearby dance-halls. The Chicago 
Women's Aid is co-operating with the Board of Education in the main- 
tenance of this center and through their help activities have been pro- 
vided for adults as well as young people. 

What these centers mean to the twenty-four neighborhoods in which 
they exist is embraced largely, however, in the effect they are having 
upon the standards of demeanor and personal conduct of the young 
people of the various neighborhoods in which they exist. These boys 
and girls are coming in contact with forms of etiquette and social life 
which are probably superior to those which obtain in many of their 
homes. While most of the principals do not live in the neighborhood 
of their centers, yet through their day contact with the children they 
are intimately acquainted with the social and living conditions in their 
respective districts. So far not much effort has been made to reach 
the adults through the Chicago centers, but a start is now being made 
through the encouragement of parent-teacher associations. 

In Detroit one finds a similar kind of development, that is, the 
aim is to provide a wholesome, enjoyable environment for boys and 
girls of the adolescent period. Much emphasis is laid upon the activities 
promoting physical education; civic motives are also quite prominent. 



An effort is made to give the girls from immigrant homes lessons in 
cooking and dressmaking, while the boys are afforded opportunities for 
manual training ; in that way the assimilation of the more recent immi- 
grants is promoted. But the adults of the various neighborhoods are 
not very generally reached. 

The Boston evening centers are all housed in high school buildings, 
so that their patrons come from sections instead of neighborhoods. As 
might be expected, the activities have a decided cultural emphasis. 
Orchestras, brass bands, banjo clubs, and choruses, as well as dramatic 
and art embroidery clubs, are very common. The club idea is promi- 
nent and an effort is made to inculcate the principles of self-government 
in all the groups. Adult welfare clubs which meet regularly to discuss 
current civic questions are connected with several of the centers, but 
they have practically no part in the management of the work. The 
Boston centers have large attendances and are successfully exercising 
a valuable educational and recreational influence upon the lives of their 
clientele. There is a conscious motive to promote self-government, but 
it has not yet changed the plan of work to the point of giving the young 
people real administrative responsibilities as a means of attaining 
that end. 

Stimulating Civic Spirit 

The Rochester social centers, as organized by Mr. Ward, while in- 
cluding a very thorough recreation program, revealed nevertheless a more 
conscious effort to affect neighborhood development than had hitherto 
been shown in school extension work. The aim there from the outset 
was to make the schoolhouse the center for all classes of people — adults 
as well as young people. So that while there were game rooms and 
gymnastic classes, the most significant features were to be found in the 
civic clubs which were organized among the men, the women, and the 
young people. These clubs came from the immediate neighborhoods, 
and they discussed local questions, the majority of them having a 
municipal import rather than a strictly neighborhood one. The women's 
clubs entertained the men's clubs, and both took turns in conducting 
the general Saturday night occasions. There was a league of the men's 
civic clubs which accomplished much in promoting playgrounds, se- 
curing better street car service, establishing public comfort stations, 
and similar municipal improvements. While a very strong civic inter- 
est was thus developed, these clubs did not participate largely and re- 
sponsibly in the management of their own activities, and therein may 
be found one of the reasons why, when the board of education cut off 
the funds for their administration and direction, they practically all 
went out of existence. 

In Louisville the Board of Education gives only heat, light and 
janitor service. All the expense of direction and supervision is borne 
by the voluntary organizations which brought the centers into existence 



and are now conducting them. The work began three years ago and is 
growing larger each year, five centers now being maintained. To estab- 
lish a center a neighborhood has to develop a petition with one hundred 
signatures, raise a certain amount of money, and promise the board to 
support the center long enough to make a thorough trial. Nearly one 
hundred volunteer workers coming from the kindergarten association and 
the girls' and women's clubs are performing the work. Each center has 
a council of its own made up of members from its own organizations, 
and the local council sends two representatives to the central social 
center council, which is composed of these representatives and the 
school officials immediately concerned. In that way a large number of 
people have become vitally connected either in the direction or mainten- 
ance of these centers, and over 90 per cent, of the attendance at each 
center comes from within six blocks. While Louisville has not enjoyed 
the services of a salaried director, it has been most fortunate in hav- 
ing in Miss Pauline F. Witherspoon a volunteer who is an expert in social 
center organization. 

The evening recreation centers of New York City for over a decade 
have been doing in the main precisely what the social centers of Chicago 
and Detroit have been doing — that is, inculcating better standards of 
behavior and giving young people a wholesome place in which to spend 
their evenings. They afford a quiet game and reading room, gym- 
nasiums or indoor play rooms, basket ball, folk dancing, and kindred 
indoor games. Clubs of all sorts are also found, as well as quiet study 
rooms for day-school children. Two-thirds of the centers are exclusively 
for boys and one-third of them for girls. Of late years the girls of the 
senior clubs have been allowed to have recommended boys from neigh- 
boring centers in at their mixed dances. The recreation center staffs 
have been most successful in bringing in the young people and but few 
adult organizations have been formed. The various club entertainments 
help to develop an initiative on the part of their members, but only 
occasionally do these doings have reference to their immediate neigh- 
borhoods. The members of the staff are trained mainly in recreational 
activities and club work, and on account of the vacation schools and 
school playgrounds during the summer months they have all-year-round 
duties in connection with the schools. The supervision, now in the 
energetic hands of Dr. Edward W. Stitt, is highly centralized so that 
naturally a considerable uniformity of method prevails. 

Developing Neighborhood Responsibility 
With a view to learning to what extent these centers could be made 
larger factors in neighborhood development a couple of rather significant 
experiments have been recently carried on by volunteer committees in 
several of the New York school buildings. Upon the initiative of the 
People's Institute a committee composed of specially interested persons 
was formed to carry on a social center experiment at Public School 63. 
Three wealthy citizens provided a budget of $3,000. The committee 



chose Mr. Clinton S. Childs, a trained social worker, to become the 
organizing secretary. Permission was secured from the Board of Edu- 
cation to carry on work in connection with the recreation center staff 
at the school chosen. Mr. Childs became a resident of the community 
and the results of his work are now — a year later — plainly visible. In 
an early stage of his efforts a mass meeting of the residents was 
called and a local association formed made up of volunteers and those 
whose names were presented by the people. Gradually more and more 
duties were placed upon the local association, so that it now assigns 
the use of the auditorium and other rooms for the special occasions 
of the clubs which meet in the center and supervises the social dances 
and motion picture shows as well as other doings of a general nature. . 
From these activities and the other entertainments and the dues of the 
members the association raises money for the support of the work. 
During the past year it raised about $700. Each club in the center has 
a representative in the association. This body has exercised an im- 
portant influence in molding the policy of the work. With the inaugu- 
ration of the social center work boys were admitted to the center, which 
had hitherto been limited to girls. Among the more important develop- 
ments of the experiment may be mentioned very successful social dances 
in the courtyard and inside playroom ; a people's forum wherein a local 
cloakmakers' union held fourteen largely attended discussions on the 
topic "Agreements Between Employers and Employees' Associations;" 
two orchestras encouraged or developed among the musicians of the 
district; several partisan political meetings; a New Year's Eve party; 
and motion picture entertainments. The center is now planning a large 
pageant embracing 2,500 people, in which the various races living in 
the community will present episodes out of their own respective his- 
tories. 

In a school located in what is known as the Greenwich Village dis- 
trict — one of the few old New York neighborhoods which still retain 
their identity, about which streams of ever-changing foreign population 
have swirled but failed to tear it from its foundation, a district which 
has a notably large proportion of native born to foreign born — the 
second experiment which I wish to describe was carried on. A com- 
mittee of women connected with a prominent Fifth Avenue church 
near this district raised the funds for employing an expert social center 
director, Mr. Boyd Fisher. He with one or two assistants developed a 
social center undertaking which for the past nine months or more has 
been carried on by a local body known as the Greenwich Commission. 
This organization is composed of twenty-five members who are elected 
by all those adults of the district who have registered at the center 
fourteen days prior to the election. This body employs three or four 
assistants and raises a budget through its entertainments, club dues 
and private contributions of about $100 a month. Nineteen different 
clubs or groups have been formed. The largest of these is known as 
the Commonwealth, and it refers simply to the audiences of citizens 



who come out on Thursday evenings to listen to the addresses from 
aldermen, state senators, city officials, and other speakers who are asked 
to come in and discuss the leading questions of the day. Each club 
member pays dues of five cents a week, which are turned into the treas- 
ury of the Commission. When entertainments are given 35 per cent, 
of the net proceeds are also given to the Commission. The privileges 
afforded young people include boxing instruction, games room, basket 
ball and indoor athletic sports. The Board of Education furnishes in 
the person of a recreation center principal expert direction of its recre- 
ational activities. The salary of this worker and that of the custodian 
are also provided by the Board of Education. In this undertaking at 
Public School 41 we have an excellent example of a self-governing 
neighborhood social center. 

NeighborliGod Development Dependent Upon Organization 

To summarize: It would seem that there are two fairly distinct 
types of social center development : The first, as represented in Chicago 
and Detroit and the recreation centers of New York City, is characterized 
by the fact that there is no special effort to organize the neighborhood 
into a co-operative responsible element in the government of the center. 
In selecting activities, those are provided which are considered to be good 
for the people upon whom they are bestowed. Administration is cen- 
tered in a central bureau, and under the direction of highly trained 
experts. The attitude of the officials is that of conducting improving 
and cultural activities for an unprivileged class of people. 

The second type of development is that which is illustrated in vary- 
ing degrees by the work at Rochester, Louisville and in the New York 
social centers at Public School 63 and Public School 41. Here there is 
on the part of the promoters a conscious purpose to develop neighbor- 
hood organization. In differing degrees the neighborhoods are called 
upon to support and participate in the management of their centers. 
In determining the character of the activities the needs of the people 
are studied with an attitude of detachment. The high-priced directing 
ability and wealth of initiative tends to be found at the school 
rather than in the central office. This more democratic type of social 
center calls for higher ability in the local director, it requires fewer 
paid assistants and shows a marked tendency to maintain such self- 
supporting activities as social dancing and motion picture entertain- 
ments. 

There is a feeling abroad, sometimes expressed but more generally 
latent, that social centers tend to withdraw young people from parental 
influence. When considering what type of social center administration 
is to be preferred, should not this fact be borne in mind? Certainly that 
is not a worthy ideal which contemplates merely giving out culture 
or wholesome recreational opportunities or a finer type of social life 
without endeavoring at the same time to develop the ability of the peo- 



pie to provide the same things for themselves. Are we performing 
our full duty if we do not develop in the parents' minds the same ideals 
for their young people which we ourselves hold? If we do not give them 
the experience of sharing in the work and the direction of the social 
center will they be able to give as taxpayers an intelligent financial 
support to it? If we do not enlist the co-operation of neighborhoods in 
the management of their own centers will not the opportunities they 
provide tend to be used more and more exclusively by the less privileged 
classes and the democratic scope of the institution be thus seriously 
impaired? 

If in the self-governing centers the programs do not run off so 
smoothly nor the activities appear so well regulated as they do in the 
other centers we may well console ourselves with the thought that "self 
government is better than good government." 



10 



Wider Use of the School 
Plant 



By Clarence Arthur Perry 



CON TENTS 

IlTHErSVIDER USE 
II EVENING SCHOOLS 

III EVENING SCHOOLS ABROAD 

IV THE PROMOTION OF ATTENDANCE AT EVENING SCHOOLS 
V VACATION SCHOOLS 

VI SCHOOL PLAYGROUNDS 

VII PUBLIC LECTURES AND ENTERTAINMENTS 

VIII EVENING RECREATION CENTERS 

IX SOCIAL CENTERS 

X ORGANIZED ATHLETICS, GAMES AND FOLK DANCING 

XI MEETINGS IN SCHOOL HOUSES 

XII SOCIAL BETTERMENT THROUGH WIDER USE 

"The 'Wider Use' has been a text-book for me 
in Starting the work here."— MlSS PAULINE F. 
WiTHERSPOON, Organizer and Supervisor of Social 
Centers, Louisville, Ky. 

"It is the result of a long and diligent gathering 
of facts, the presentation of which will surprise most 
readers, no doubt, and at the same time impress them 
with the exceeding reasonableness of their signifi- 
cance." — The Literary Digest. 

3rd Edition 423 Pages 51 Illustrations Full Index 

Price, Postpaid, $1.25 

Send orders to the Publishers 

THE SURVEY ASSOCIATES, Inc. 

105 East 22nd Street, New York City 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



■ 020 773 120 1 

Publications of the Department of 
Recreation 



Russell Sage Foundation 

130 East 22nd Street, New York City 



As the prices indicate, these pamphlets ore not sold for a profit. The sma'l charge is made Jot the purpose 

of helping to meet the cost of printing and postage, thus enabling the Department 

to put out a larger number of publications than It otherwise 

could with its allotted funds. 



General Recreation 



Rec. 76 Exercise and Rest. Gulick. 
7 pp. 5 cts. 

Rec. 106 Recreation Legislation. 

Hanmer. 68 pp. 20 cU. 

Rec. 136 Sources of Information 
on Recreation. Hanmer and 
Knight. 27 pp. 10 cts. 

Rec. 143 Recreation in Spring- 
field. 111.; a Section of the 
Springfield Survey. Hanmer 
and Perry. 130 pp. 25c. 



Athletics 



Rec. 140 Group Athleticsf or Boys. 

(Bulletin.) 2 cts. 

Rec. 141 Group Athletics for Girls. 

(Bulletin.) 2 cts. 



Festivals and Celebrations 



Rec. 53 May Day Celebrations. 

Burchenal. 14 pp. 5 cU. 

Rec. 114 Celebration of the Fourth 
of July by Means of Pageantry. 

Langdon. 54 pp. 15 cts. 

Rec. 129 Independence Day Leg- 
islation and Celebration Sug- 
ges'ions. Hanmer. 36 pp. 10 cts. 



Folk Dancing 



Rec. 1 18 Folk Dancing. Gulick. 26 
pp. 5 cts. 



Wider Use of the School 
Plant 



Rec. 119 Sources of Speakers and 
Topics for Pub'ic Lectures in 
School Buildings. Perry. 36 pp. 
5 eta. 



Rec. 1 20 Social Center Features 
in New Elementary School Ar- 
chitecture. Perry. 48 pp. 25 cts. 

Rec. 1 25 How to Start Social Cen- 
ters. Perry 28 pp. 10 cts. 

Rec. 135 The Social Centers of 
1912-13. Perry. 8 pp. 5 cts. 

Rec. 137 The Real Snag in Social 
Center Extension. Perry. 8 pp. 
5 eta. 



Rec. 138 The High School as a 
Social Center. Perry. 31 pp. 
10 cts. 



Rec. 1 42 The School as a Factor in 
Neighborhood Development. 

Perry. 8 pp. 5 eta. 



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